


Another Island

by The_fic_was_better



Category: Touching Spirit Bear - Ben Mikaelson
Genre: M/M, Talk of Suicide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-13
Updated: 2019-06-13
Packaged: 2020-05-07 05:34:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,731
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19202926
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/The_fic_was_better/pseuds/The_fic_was_better
Summary: After Peter's third suicide attempt, Cole tries to recapture the peace they felt on the island.





	Another Island

**Author's Note:**

> The events in this fic occur 3-4 years after the end of Ghost of Spirit Bear.

Cole wasn’t sure what to do with himself now that he was here. The hospital room was stark white, with only one quiet occupant. The TV screen was dark, the only sound came from the hall.

Peter was asleep in the bed closest to the window. He was as pale against the pillow, his scalp almost gray, freshly shaven so the electrodes would stick to his skin.

Cole thought he was asleep, until Peter said “Hey,” without opening his eyes.

The two years since they’d last seen each other disappeared, and Cole fell into the chair by the bed. “Pete.”

“You came all this w-...way,” Peter said. Up close, his lips were dry and cracked, victims of the filtered hospital air.

“Of course I came.”

Peter opened his eyes for the first time. They were glassy with barely-numbed pain. “It was three...three hundred m-...miles. I meant...you could’ve just c-...called.”

Cole found his friend’s hand and squeezed, accidentally causing the buckle of the padded cuff to click against the plastic bed rail. “No way, Pete. No way.”

# # #

The island had saved them both. The lessons Cole learned there stayed with him through senior year and trade school. He still got angry, still felt the rage that moved within him like a caged, pacing animal, but the quiet place in his mind was rarely out of reach.

It had been different for Peter.

It wasn’t that the island had taught Peter less, but rather that he’d been hurt more deeply, or at least differently. 

A lifetime of unfair circumstances and poor choices haunted Cole’s past: a father that hurt him, a mother that let it happen, and teachers that would rather give him detention than look at him too closely.

But none of that was in him. He could turn away from it. In the end, Cole was the one who decided who Cole would be.

That wasn’t to say it had been easy.

But no matter how hard it was for Cole, it was harder for Peter--or so Cole suspected. Peter almost never complained, but he couldn’t shake off brain damage like it was a bad mood. He couldn’t walk off a shuffling limp. He could learn to manage the volatile emotions that stormed within him--something Cole understood only too well--but it would always be a full time job.

He’d attempted suicide twice in his teens.

The week after his twenty-first birthday saw that figure shoot up to three.

# # #

Cole checked into the hotel after dark. His apprenticeship paid enough that he could afford to stay a few days.

But only a few days.

After he got his room key, he took a walk to the corner store for a passable dinner: a fountain soda and a hot dog off the roller. A table of tacky souvenirs caught his eye on his way to the counter.

“This it for you, hon?” the cashier asked as she rang him up.

Cole took out his wallet, but paused. “Oh. And some Chapstick.”

# # #

Peter was sitting up in bed when Cole arrived the next day. He looked up from his tray of hospital food and smiled.

“Look! New privileges!” he said, and indicated the solid food. Neither of them mentioned the restraints he’d worn yesterday--but not today. The padded cuffs hung open from the bed rails like a warning to behave. Cole didn’t like looking at them; they seemed to take up too much space in the room.

He dropped a brown paper bag on the table next to Peter’s lunch.

Peter crammed a spoonful of mashed potatoes into his mouth and asked thickly, “W-...what’s this?” He tipped the bag towards himself and looked inside.

“The corner store on eighth sends its regards.”

“My l-...lab partner got food poisoning there.”

Cole thought regretfully of last night’s hot dog.

“It was bad t-...too. They were puking for...for days. They got so dehy-...dehy-...” He shook his head and blinked. “Anyway, their skin wrinkled up like--like--hey!” Peter grinned broadly with half of his mouth. The other half still wasn’t working quite right. He held up the gift Cole had bought last night: a pen carved like a white bear. “Might be worth taking notes long-...longhand again.”

“I know it’s corny,” Cole said, feeling suddenly bashful.

“I’ve outgrown corny. Now I’m i-...ironic.” Peter stood the pen up in the cup holder so the bear was looking at him. He dug back into the paper bag. “Nice,” he quipped upon finding the Chapstick.

It took him an age to peel off the label. His hands were shaky. Cole didn’t offer to do it for him, and Peter didn’t ask for help.

“Damn,” he said when the Chapstick was finally rid of its safety seal. “I’m tired.” His head fell back to the pillow. The bed was propped up so he wasn’t lying flat, but throat looked pale and vulnerable. His Adam’s apple bobbed with his next dry swallow.

His fist squeezed once, weakly, around the Chapstick tube.

Cole took it from him. “What kind of tired?” The cap came off with a pop.

“Not...not now, Cole. Just...let’s just...save it.” Peter’s eyes were drifting closed, but they widened marginally when Cole held the Chapstick aloft between them.

Cole lifted an eyebrow.

Peter hesitated. Color crept into his wan cheeks. Then he tipped his chin, barely parting his lips. His muscles were trembly, even at rest, and Cole had to cup the back of his head to keep him still during the application.

When he was done, Cole dropped the Chapstick into the cup holder with the bear pen. He stood up. “I’ll let you get some rest.”

He’d made it to the doorway before Peter called softly, “Cole.”

Cole looked back.

“I really thought I was...was going to die.”

Cole clenched and unclenched his fist, but didn’t let his anger show on his face. “We all thought you were gonna die, Pete.”

“Do you know what--what I saw?” Peter didn’t wait for Cole’s guess before answering himself: “The island. And you.”

# # #

Cole flipped through the open tabs on his work laptop one more time. He sucked at math. The hotel napkins could attest to that, all of them scratched and tattered with double- and triple-checked equations, even the simple ones.

He nodded to himself. His eyes were sore with exhaustion. The hotel bed--nicer than he was used to--was calling. But first a phone call.

He had to leave a voicemail.

Stupid, he chastened himself, looking at the glowing red digital clock. Who did he think was going to answer? Midnight’s hardly within normal business hours.

# # #

“Hey,” Peter said without looking up. He was hunched over in bed, scribbling in a notebook. His voice was stronger today, less breathy, less hesitant.

Cole fell into the now-familiar chair beside the hospital bed and asked, on the verge of laughter, “Are you working on your next blog post?”

Peter’s pen froze. He looked up from the page. “You read my b-...blog?”

Cole blushed, but Peter laughed it off.

“No,” Peter said. “My lab...partner dropped off some of m-...my stuff.” he gestured to the bookbag at the foot of his bed, the textbooks and notes spread over the blankets, and his laptop charging nearby. “I’ve got home...homework. And then I need to e-...email my prof...fessors and ask how I’m go-...going to take my finals.” He paused to catch his breath, and a thought seemed to occur to him all at once. “What about y-...you? You’re almost done with...school.”

“One more month.”

“Going to be an elec--electrician, aren’t...aren’t you?’

“I’m already an electrician. Soon they’ll just have to pay me better.”

Peter smiled crookedly. He still didn’t look like himself, with his head shaved, his body draped in pastel gowns, and electrodes clinging to his chest and scalp. But his pupils were both the same size today, and Cole noticed (not for the first time) that he’d gained weight. The “freshman fifteen,” Cole had heard it called, and he wondered briefly what it would be like to press his thumb into the soft skin of Peter’s arm.

As if Peter could read minds, he said softly, “You look good, Cole.”

Cole seemed to’ve caught Peter’s stutter. “I--what?”

Peter curled one arm and flexed a pudgy bicep. “They got you doing--doing a lot of heavy li-...lifting?”

Cole drummed his fingers frantically against the bed rail. Then, before he could chicken out, he stood up and slipped both arms under Peter, scooping him up from the bed.

Peter yelped in surprise and hugged his notebook before it could slide off his lap. Still suspended in Cole’s arms, his heart monitor beeped a little faster, and one of the nurses stuck her head in the room curiously.

“For goodness’s sake, put him down!” she cried.

Peter and Cole were both shaking with laughter, but Cole obeyed.

“I think that’s enough visiting for today,” the nurse said.

“Five more minutes,” Peter said.

“Two.” She left the room.

“They’re monitoring me for blood clots,” Peter said when they were alone. His voice carried a light, conspiratorial tone. “I’m not sup-...supposed to get--get ‘worked up.’”

“Oh, my God,” Cole said, still leaning over the bed after lowering Peter. “I didn’t realize…”

Peter waved a dismissive hand. “Everybody worries...worries too much.”

“Peter.”

Peter looked up at him. He seemed smaller without any hair.

Cole said, “I’ve got to head home tonight. I can’t miss another day of school or work.”

“Oh. Yeah. T-...totally. You didn’t have to--to come, you know.”

“I know.”

“But it was good...good to see you.”

“I should’ve come sooner.”

“Sooner than im-...immediately?” Peter asked with a quirk of his one responsive eyebrow.

“I mean just to visit,” Cole said. He shook his head in genuine disbelief. “Two years. They just… How the hell did two years slip away like that?”

“School.” Peter shrugged. “L-...life.”

Cole bit his bottom lip. And then… “See you next weekend,” he decided, reaching for his wallet and keys. He was gone before Peter could argue.

# # #

Peter’s recovery happened in little increments. He passed all his finals from his hospital bed. He learned how to walk again. When the doctors and nurses cleared him for discharge, Cole was parked in front of the hospital’s main entrance.

“I’m starving,” Peter said the moment his butt hit the passenger seat. His hair had grown in a little, though not altogether evenly.

“We can eat,” Cole said, “but it’s gotta be drive-thru.”

“You’re in a b-...big hurry to get rid--rid of me, then?”

Cole put the car in DRIVE. “I want to show you something.”

# # # 

Cole’s dad had been sober for eighteen months, but a sober asshole was still an asshole.

It had taken weeks of back-and-forth phone calls with Mr. Matthews’s assistant before they’d come to an arrangement.

Now Cole slotted the key in the stiff lock and jimmied it till the tumblers clicked into place and he could turn the knob. The door was so rotten he probably could’ve put a boot through it if the lock had jammed.

Peter entered the hunting lodge after him and looked around. One room. A woodstove. Rain barrels on the roof provided the only water. There was an outhouse and a smokehouse that looked deceptively similar if you were outside at night. A waist-deep creek cut through the backyard, and five acres of forest wrapped the small property in a private embrace.

The only light was what came through the papered-over, duct-tape-reinforced windows.

Peter turned slowly in place, taking it in--the cobwebs, the creaky floorboards, the moth-eaten furniture. He came to a stop when he faced Cole again. “What...what is this?”

“Thought it might be a nice place to spend the summer.” Cole moved around the room, ripping down newspaper and duct tape so more sunlight could shine in.

“The summer,” Peter said, and Cole squirmed with the sensation of being seen.

“Or longer,” Cole said, finally admitting, “It’s mine. Technically.”

“Since w-...when?”

“Oh. Um. Two days ago. But it’s been in the works since...you know.”

“You bought this because of me,” Peter said, without even a hint of stutter.

Cole tried to laugh. “What?”

“You feel re-...responsible for--for me. Guilty.”

“No--”

“Cole.”

“I bashed your fucking head in, Pete.”

“Y-...yeah. And then you s-...saved my life.”

“You tried to kill yourself three times.”

“Twice.”

Cole looked down at his hand, bewildered, counting off on his fingers.

Peter said, “I haven’t lapsed since be-...before the island.”

Cole let his arms swing at his sides. “Don’t lie to me, Peter. I saw the hospital restraints. You were on suicide watch.”

“For less than...less than twenty-four hours. Until I could wake...wake up and explain. I have a his-...history. Suicide watch was just a...a precaution.”

“What the hell happened, then?”

“I got drunk and fell!” Peter said, his temper rising. “I’d just turned twenty-...twenty-one! I had a few--few drinks. I’m clumsy enough so-...sober. I took a...a spill.”

Cole blinked back his surprise. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Because I kn-...knew one way or a--another you’d blame your--yourself. If I’d tried to kill myself, you...you’d say you’re to b-blame because of when we were k-...kids. If I tripped and fell, y-...you’d still t-...take the blame. And any...anyway. I know you don’t like dr-...drinking.” Peter sat down hard in one of the rickety kitchen chairs. He was trembling. “This place isn’t...isn’t the island. We already tried to re-...recreate the island. Remember the free-....freezer? The bowling balls?”

“I know it’s not the island,” Cole said. “But it could be our island.”

Peter rested a knobby elbow on the table and scrubbed his knuckles against his mouth. He looked around again, and then side-eyed Cole suspiciously.

“It’s true, I read your blog,” Cole said, talking quickly lest they fall back into their previous argument. “I know it hasn’t been easy for you, living in the city, surrounded by people all the time. No peace. No quiet. We can’t live on the island. It belongs to nature, not us. But we can find peace and quiet here. The lodge is already built. And I can wire it all myself. And everything else it needs--I can do that too.”

Peter waited a moment. Then he asked, “Is it safe?”

“Safe?”

“Is it gonna c-...cave in on us while we sleep?”

Cole looked at the exposed beams. “It might be worth jacking that middle one up. You know. For the time being. Another couple weeks, a month, I can get this place looking--”

“No rush,” Peter interrupted. “I kind of...like it. The way it is.”

# # #

It didn’t take long to settle in. Peter shucked his belongings from his college dorm, and Cole cleaned out his tiny apartment back home. He’d said summer, but when it came time to renew his lease in July, he didn’t bother, and when Peter’s junior year loomed, he re-enrolled as an off-campus student.

Cole found a job in town as an electrician, making service calls to the little houses sprinkled throughout the woods and suburbs. He never did wire the lodge for electricity. He came home every night to gravity-fed plumbing and an outhouse. When the weather was nice, he’d find Peter in the garden, vertigo and shaky hands doing nothing to stop him from digging and weeding, or down by the creek fishing. He liked to joke that the constant trembling attracted fish better than motionless bait, and it was true--his number of catches was twice that of Cole’s.

They ate dinner by the light of a kerosene lamp, and when he didn’t feel like making the drive to the campus library, Peter did his schoolwork with the tacky spirit bear pen.

They slept under the at.oow each and every night, unless it was too hot. Then they slept on the at.oow, and under the stars.

It was everything Cole hadn’t realized he’d wanted, and here, he’d finally found it, in a crumbling hunting lodge with only one bed.


End file.
